Today I made Ethan his first Sensory Box!  I made it a beach theme, with oats as a base (I wanted something edible, just in case Ethan puts it in his mouth, but not too tempting that he'll eat it all!)  and put in some sand toys.



What you'll need:

• porridge oats
• large box or bin (one with shallow sides is best)
• sand toys

Ethan had so much fun scooping up the oats and throwing them all around.  He felt them through his fingers, getting familiar with the rough texture of them.  Of course had a little taste and poured them out of the buckets and shovels. Such a lovely sensory activity for his Knowledge and Understanding of the World as he explored the oats in a very unique way.


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We've had a lovely gift from Ethan's Great Aunt, it's a Heuristic Play Treasure Box!  She collected up a load of lovely items and put them all together for Ethan to play with and explore. Here's more information about treasure baskets from The Imagination Tree as she's got lots of different options on her blog.



In the basket there are all sorts of items made of different materials, many of which can be found around the house.  There's wooden kitchen utensils (like a rolling pin), natural elements (like a pine cone), metal items (like a whisk, Ethan's favourite), cloth items (a piece of satin and some felt squares).  There are so many lovely things in the basket, Ethan sometimes focuses on just one item to play with and sometimes goes through them all until he finds just what he's looking for.



Ethan absolutely loves it!  He enjoys taking all of the items out of the box and examining them, bashing them together and, of course, putting them in his mouth.  It's interesting for me as well, to see how much he enjoys playing with all of the metal items.  Of course we don't have any metal baby toys and Ethan is really enjoying exploring this new material, a part of his Knowledge and Understanding of the World.

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A friend gave us a couple of peekaboo books; Peekaboo Jungle and Rainbow Colours Peekaboo.  Ethan loves them!  He lays on the floor turning the pages and lifting the flaps.  It's the most interested he's ever been in books on his own, and it's so adorable to watch him "reading" :)

Now that Ethan is sitting up it seems that there are all sorts of toys that he can play with that he couldn't before.  We got out the stacking cups today, made towers with them and he happily knocked them down over and over again.

Ethan loves to play with his Skwish!  It's fun to squish and squash and the beads move back and forth.  He can throw it around and it's light and easy for him to play with.

We often play with rain-sticks at baby classes and the babies sometimes drop them on themselves and get hurt, so I had a hunt around and found these brilliant rainstick balls and got one for Ethan.  He absolutely loves it and can hold onto it easily and throw it around, and is mesmerised by the sound it makes.  He's getting better at sitting up everyday and I think this will be even more fun when he can sit and roll the ball.

Today was Ethan's Christening day!  We decided to have Ethan Christened in Cape Town (where his Daddy's from) and then someday if we're lucky enough to have another baby we'll have them Christened in Canada (where I'm from) or here in London.  As we don't live in Cape Town, we don't have a regular church and minister, so we found a lovely little stone chapel at The Range and found a minister online who could perform the ceremony.



We were very lucky, as even though we didn't know the minister personally, he performed the ceremony beautifully and said some really lovely things.  We chose Ethan's Aunt and his Daddy's best friend as Ethan's Godparents, and it was wonderful to have them both there (as well as many other guests) to share in Ethan's special day.



After a lovely ceremony we went back to Ethan's Grandparents house for the Noah's Ark themed celebration.  We had a Noah's Ark cake (made by a family friend), animal themed snacks in animal bowls, Noah's Ark plates and napkins, animal toys and books for the other children to play with and look at, and a tissue paper rainbow as a part of the decorations.



























Everyone had a lovely time at the party, we are so blessed to have had so many people there to share in Ethan's special day and so generously give him such beautiful gifts.  Thank you very much to Ethan's Grandparents for hosting the party and to everyone who came to celebrate with us :)

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